Although Oscar rules now permit as many as 10 best-picture nominees — a change designed to include more popular movies — this year's slate of nine films features just one movie that's made more than $100 million: The Help, which earned $170 million this summer.

The previous two years each had 10 nominees and included five movies that did more than $100 million, according to Box Office Mojo.

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"The Academy Awards were supposed to roll in movies that people had actually seen, to provide some balance," says Jeff Bock of the industry tracking firm Exhibitor Relations. But in 2011, "we never got it."

The next two most popular nominees, Steven Spielberg's War Horse ($77 million) and Brad Pitt's Moneyball ($76 million) did solid, if unspectacular, business. And while there are two weeks to go before the Feb. 26 ceremony, analysts don't expect any films to join The Help in the nine-digits club.

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James Cameron's 'Titanic,' with Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet, is the highest-grossing best-picture winner, having earned $600,788,188 at the domestic box office.

That could alter the race, observers say. Though The Artist ($21 million) remains a heavy favorite to win best picture, The Help could overtake George Clooney's The Descendants ($66 million) and Martin Scorsese's Hugo ($62 million) as a rival to the silent black-and-white film.

The Help, with its segregation theme, "is a 'cause' movie," says Keith Simanton, managing editor of the Internet Movie Database (IMDb.com). That and the film's box-office success make it this year's "populist nod," he says.

Many thought that designation would go to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2 ($381 million). Prognosticators expected that the seventh installment would pick up a best-picture nomination, much like The Lord of the Rings did with its third and final installment, The Return of the King, in 2003. That film earned $377 million and collected 11 Oscars, including best picture.

"In 20 years, it's likely people will say Harry Potter never got nominated," Simanton says. "Will they remember that The Tree of Life ($13 million) was? I'm not sure."

Still, the Oscars weren't meant as a popularity contest, Simanton says, and some small nominated films are seeing atypical commercial success.

Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris did $57 million, a high for the director. And The Artist could do $50 million by the end of its run — "pretty impressive for a black-and-white movie," Simanton says.

"Let's face it: The academy is an exclusive circle — they're supposed to vote on what they like best," Bock says. "That doesn't have to match the taste of the masses."